


Common People

by rhenia_ra



Category: Merlin (BBC)
Genre: Character Study, F/M, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-26
Updated: 2010-06-26
Packaged: 2017-10-10 07:05:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/96990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rhenia_ra/pseuds/rhenia_ra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At some point, Arthur begins to think he just has some <i>thing</i> for servants.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Common People

  
I.

At some point, Arthur begins to think he just has some _thing_ for servants.

Well, not necessarily a _thing_ as in a sexual or a romantic thing, except for yes, sort of like that as well. He loves Gwen, and for a long time he tells himself it's because she _teaches_ him things-- she disciplines him in her own way, tells him about the king he will come to be, how to become him. He is more astonished by her quiet suggestions than he ever has been by Merlin's brazen insubordinations (treason, really). She will duck into his chambers unannounced, something she must have learned from her mistress, look him straight in the eye, and _criticize_ him. He loves her for that for quite some time.

And, after that, he thinks he loves her because she's beautiful, because of the slow way in which she articulates truths, and the way her eyes never waver. She dresses plainly in comparison to the women at court, her black curls wound into a knot at the back of her head; Morgana's hand-me-down dresses, worn and faded with time, lay softly on her body instead of holding her upright, allow her to move about her work rather than restricting her to a chair, to her place at the elbow of a man. He watches her move and forgets to be ashamed for it, watches her dark hands smooth out sheets on a line; her fingers are calloused and yet hold more grace than a morning lark and he _watches_ them, wants them.

After Lancelot, though, it's different.

  
II.

Gwen loves Arthur, in her own way.

He's gorgeous, after all, in a conventional sort of manner; not that "conventional" is a bad thing, simply not what she'd expected to be attracted to-- she hadn't been kidding when she'd told Merlin that she went for more ordinary men, those many months ago. At that point in her life, she realizes now, she'd been trying to love Merlin (Bit like trying to love your little brother, though, really; not that Merlin is annoying in the way that little brothers are known to be, like Morgana says Arthur is to her, it's just that Merlin is far too cute, far too—well, he's certainly not ordinary—but something about him is simply off limits).

Arthur is far from ordinary, being the king and all that. He's braver than she'd first expected him to be, and he's strong of body and, she learns gradually, of mind as well. She admires him. She watches him fall in love with her, watches him watch her, and, for a time, she falls in love with him as well. What she really does is watch him change, you see, she watches him grow and she thinks, "What an amazing man he is to become." She loves him as he changes and she learns to love the way his arms and his eyes, more intensely blue than anything she's ever seen, feel around her body.

It's never to last, of course, because, well, Arthur is simply not ordinary. With Uther for a father, no one is ordinary, no one can _be_ ordinary.

Gwen loves Arthur, in her own way, but she finds solace in Lancelot.

  
III.

Merlin thinks that Gwen is the best thing, apart from his own ass-saving magic, that has ever happened to Arthur.

When Merlin comes to his Prince to offer his vast wisdom in exchange for _nothing_ (a bit of respect though, really, would be nice), he tends to get one of two things: the stocks or a clap to the head. Often both. Gwen, however, is immune to this treatment, which possibly has something to do with the being-a-girl thing, but very well may be because she's a bit quieter about it (though Merlin isn't quite apt to entertain that idea for long). Arthur doesn't just take the time to listen to Gwen, he takes the time to understand her, which is, Merlin thinks, what counts.

She has changed him and he has watched it before his very eyes. Arthur, once a prat, is now a _slightly wiser_ prat. She has instructed him so often in the ways and the needs of the common people that Arthur has even begun to understand these things on his own, on a day-to-day basis. Guinevere, Merlin tells Arthur, will make a great Queen someday because she can do everything Arthur cannot and she can make the things he _can_ do better.

"_Will_ make a great Queen?" Arthur says, "You sound so sure."

And Merlin tells him that _Of course_ he's sure, he knows these destiny things like the back of his hand.

It helps too, that they make a really lovely pair, all contrasting colors, with Gwen's soft body next to Arthur's larger build-- not that Merlin would ever admit to Arthur that he finds them to be a cute couple because, well, he's not as much of an idiot as he lets on. He'd much rather watch from afar, in this case, smile in response to Arthur's own grin, so much softer now that he's found love in Gwen, offer a shoulder to lean on when Arthur sees her supple hand enveloped in Lancelot's. She will make a fine Queen still, he tells himself, because Arthur deserves to have her.

"You've still got me," he tells Arthur, and watches his Prince, his best friend, roll his eyes.

Sometimes, Merlin thinks things might be much easier if he had been the one to change Arthur, like it was supposed to be.

  
IV.  
Arthur comes to recognize his weird little _thing_ for servants when one day, a week before he is set to leave for a vital battle on the border of Celidoine, Merlin slides into his chambers and closes the door with a dulled thud behind him. He stands then, with his hands still touching the door behind his back, and his eyes seem to follow the dust motes he, as Camelot's Worst Manservant, has left on the ground.

"What's wrong then?" Arthur asks, looking up from the maps splayed out on the small table before him.

"I've got something to tell you," Merlin begins.

Arthur could have him killed, and not just could but in almost every respect _should_. He should drag the young man by that damned scarf all the way to his father's quarters and he should shake his entire body by the neck while he says, "This man is a sorcerer, he has enchanted me and he has enchanted all of us, and he should be _killed_." But he doesn't, and _this_ is how he discovers The Servant Thing.

"You can't kill me," Merlin tells him, and he's holding his head up in that way he has, like he's Arthur's equal or some nonsense. "I taught myself a vanishing spell before I got here, just in case. And besides," he pauses, "You need me to tell you where the sword is."

Arthur stands up and crosses the room. He takes the younger man's scarf in his hand, watches as Merlin's eyes widen but remain blue, and pulls him closer. "You," he says, leaning into the other's face, where he can feel Merlin's breath coming in short hot puffs hitting his cheek "are an idiot."

  
V.

"You should really listen to Merlin," Gwen tells Arthur two days before he wanders into battle. She is careful to set the tray of food she'd accosted from the boy in question away from the haphazard piles of parchment on Arthur's table.

Arthur snorts and leans back in his chair, looking rather like he might fall backward at any moment. He does not seem at all surprised to see her. "I think the problem is," he says, "that I listen to him too much."

"He's smarter than you give him credit for," she says and watches Arthur wave her off with one hand and pick up a piece of bread with another.

"Yes well, he doesn't want _you_ to dive into a lake to retrieve a magical sword forged by dragons, now does he?"

Gwen can't help but laugh and she is pleased to watch Arthur's face soften at the sight. "And yet you're going, aren't you?"

Arthur sighs and lets the front legs of his chair hit the ground with a snap. He looks at her, and for once she cannot read him. "You know," he says suddenly, "that I love you, don't you?"

She smiles and does not miss a beat when she says, "Yes, sire, I know you do."

His face flushes a faint and sweet pink and he nods, ducks his head.

She plows on, speaks before she can tell herself not to. "And you love Merlin as well." She does not stutter.

He is silent for a long time before he says in an oddly strangled tone, "I seem to have this _thing_ with servants."

And she laughs for even longer before she tells him, "No, you simply have impeccable taste."

  
VI.

"When you become King," Merlin tells Arthur, "you'll be able to bring magic back into the kingdom, and you can marry a commoner just to show the people of Camelot that their King is in love with them."

Arthur, astride his horse beside him, shakes his golden head, water from the lake still clinging to the strands of his hair. "I'm not very well going to marry you, if that's what you're getting at."

Merlin scoffs and he feels his hands tighten on the mare's reins. She ignores him, as she always does, which in this case is just as well. "Like I'd be interested in marrying a prat like you!"

Arthur laughs and Merlin tries valiantly not to enjoy the sound of it.

"Gwen would look far better in a wedding gown than I would," Merlin says, adjusting his shoulders.

"Well that's rather a given, isn't it?" Arthur grins.

Merlin shakes his head, mumbling, "She has got her work cut out for her."

Arthur seems to consider this, and his hand strays to his hip, where Excalibur now sits like an extra limb. "I only wish her happiness," he says, and Merlin doesn't find it odd at all the way he goes all soft talking about her, and he doesn't find it odd either that he cannot stop himself before he says,

"Yes, well I promise not to get jealous."

Arthur rolls his eyes. "You and Lancelot could start a club."

Merlin's eyes snap back to his Prince. "You'll let him back in, then, to Camelot? To the knights?"

He shakes his head. "I'd be stupid not to."

Merlin grins. "She's changed you, Arthur."

Arthur pulls his eyes from the road, then, and trains them on Merlin. They are only able to hold the gaze for a moment before they pull away from one another, flushed. Arthur coughs and seems to squirm in his saddle, his clothes still damp.

He says, "She's not the one I jumped into a lake for," and the smile that Merlin feels growing on his face is more intense than any spell he's ever uttered.


End file.
